Alan Cumming is perched in his Lower East Side office and is a bundle of excited energy, even by his usual livewire standards. Not even a gaggle of hot boys languidly tossing a baseball in the park outside his window can distract him. The outlandishly attractive actor is bringing his one-man singing show to London’s West End, you see. And though it was a hit in New York and Sydney, “there’s been a gap so my nerves have kind of worked up again,” he declares. The show is about the decade he has spent residing in America and climaxes in him becoming a member of the US. We catch up with him on a sticky summer afternoon in NYC, the city he has fallen hopelessly in love with, and chat about national identity, versatile vocal pigs and why he reckons Obama’s a bona fide queer who’s just keeping us all waiting…

Tell us how I Bought a Blue Car Today came about.
I’ve always wanted to do a show like this. I’ve sung at various things like the Hollywood Bowl and every time I did it I’d be unprepared and nervous and it would just be a horrific ordeal. I’d just get through it and it would be fine and then I would think never again. But then my manager told me about this thing called the American Songbook series, where various singers and artists do their interpretation of the American songbook and perform them. Why my manager was so keen is that once you do this, you do two concerts [at New York’s famous Lincoln Center] and then you have a show because you’ve got all the arrangements for the band. I immediately asked a friend who is a musical director and composer if he could do it with me because I thought he had the right sensibility – he’s not totally Broadway. He’s got a real grounding in proper music but he doesn’t balk at the fact I want to sing a Dolly Parton song.

How did you select songs? Were they ones that had particular emotional resonance with you?
I definitely chose songs that had a personal connection and that connect with the audience, rather than the pure beauty of my soprano voice. I also tell lots of stories about why I chose the songs that I did. So they are all quite emotional. And then there are a couple of belters to pep it up.

In your novel Tommy’s Tale we got glimpses of you but that was veiled in fiction. Is this show the most revealing you’ve got about yourself?
Mmm, it’s not necessarily autobiographical. Though I do talk about things in my life. I talk about the fact that my husband Lance and I share an ex-boyfriend. And I sing a song he wrote about him. Certainly as a performer it’s the most exposed I’ve ever been: telling stories I think are hilarious and weird. It’s the weird, weird shit that’s gone on in my life while staying in America, culminating in me becoming a citizen. That’s why it’s called I Bought A Blue Car Today because that is the sentence I had to write down to prove the prowess of my English. So yes, I suppose I do tell some very revealing things now that I think about it. (laughs)

You’ve already taken it to America and the Sydney Opera House for Mardi Gras. Are you less nervous about facing London?
Although I did stand-up a long time ago with the Victor and Barry show, I’ve never done anything like this in London. There’s sometimes slight resistance in London when someone’s gone to America and come back and said: “Oh my fabulous way of life in America. Ha! Ha! Ha!” So I suppose now that I think about it that could be… [trails off] But you know what one of the most liberating things about doing this show is going: “Fuck it! I don’t care!”

We were blown away when we saw you in the gay Nazi persecution play Bent a couple of years ago. How did you feel about the homophobic reaction to it in some of the press?
I was really shocked by it. I was really shocked. It was pretty daunting that they were so dismissive. One of them said: They were asking for it. That was the gist of one of the reviews.

It’s just outrageous.
Absolutely. It was really horrifying. A lot of people felt really threatened that the production was so in your face. That’s what’s so great about the play, you see these people having a totally hedonistic lifestyle. It’s a straight person’s worst nightmare about what gay life is like: someone gets smashed, wakes up and can’t remember who fucked them. And then immediately going into this horror [of entering the Holocaust]. I was really taken aback by how the reviews weren’t focused about the play or the production. If people had objections to that I could understand, especially about the production. The play I think is really powerful and it has lasted the test of time. I’d come back to Britain and marriage equality had happened and everything seemed really rosy, so the reaction was a real eye opener. But it also reminded me that there is a whole wave of semi-elderly theatre critics, straight men, who are mean and have become jaded from going to the theatre every night.

What was so crazy was where it came from. Obviously critics can respond in different ways but the tone of it was shocking…
The one that pissed me off the most was from Charles Spencer at the Daily Telegraph. On the first night Martin Sherman [the writer] came on and said that Tom Bell [the actor who co-starred in the play when it premiered in the Royal Court in 1977] had died a couple of nights before. When we finished this big thing I gave my co-star a hug on stage. I had my top off and it was described as an unnecessary display of gay affection. But I just thought: Fuck you, I’ve just done a fucking play for the last two hours where I’m sweating like a bitch, and I’ve done scenes with this man that are just the most intense scenes that any two actors can do together. Fuck you mister! Go and deal with your issues….Hello! I think maybe he apologized to Martin Sherman for that.

You are a joint citizen of the UK and the USA, and New York is now your home. What it is that you prefer about America to the UK?
Well, it is more about New York. I wouldn’t lump New York into the rest of America. I enjoy living in New York very, very much and it has been very kind to me. It’s the kind of city where I just felt completely accepted and welcomed, and I haven’t felt that in other cities. I didn’t realise until I came to live here, but in London I was always reminded of my difference.

Was it being Scottish or gay or a bit of both?
I don’t think it was really the gay thing; it was more to do with being Scottish. It’s not just about being a different race; it’s also a class thing. I have noticed that has changed over the years since I lived in London, but nonetheless, I didn’t really notice it until I moved to New York. All the things I used to be slightly jabbed in the arm for, in a nice way, or even slightly derided for, were all part of what I became appreciated for here. Everyone is different here and difference is embraced, rather then being pointed out with “Ha! Ha! Little Scot boy!”

When you go over to America, particularly New York, you do realise how entrenched in class we are in this country. It grinds people down.
It’s not that that sort of thing doesn’t exist here. They try to say this is a classless society here and it’s absolutely not, but it’s not entrenched. As a culture, Americans are much more embracing of difference. And of success. When something goes well, like you are in a film or a play that does really well, there’s a slight thing in Britain like “Uh, uh so you’ve got a big hit on your hands then, have you?” And I have to say that gets a little old [laughs].

You said America was spiritually broken before Obama. How has the US changed?
You just hear things on the street. People reference politics and there’s a more optimistic and caring mood. That’s what is really interesting about American politics; you’re finding right now that it is really tough to get big, new things done. It’s just a two party system and it gets very partisan. But what is really huge is the sensibility that a country can change over night. And people are just kinder and more open and happier.

But can you really notice that on the street?
Just the other night I was standing outside a bar next to a drag queen. Two guys walked past and said something like, “Hey sweetie!” Someone with the drag queen shouted back to him: “She looks good” and the other guy turned back and said “Hey it’s Obama’s America, everything looks good!”

That’s kind of amazing.
I know, I know. It was lovely. It’s just things like that that just reassure you about humanity. Of course now he’s got such a lot of work to do, trying to get this fucking health bill through. While Republicans have gone back to just being hideous pigs digging their feet in. I just really admire how noble he’s being about everything he wants to do. Even though he’s not been that great about the gays I have to say. Gays aren’t happy with him right now.

You’ve called him ‘definitely queer’. But there seems to be a growing number of gay advocates who think he’s gone lukewarm on gay rights?
I really do not believe he was only kidding about his message of equality for all human beings, not just the gays. I really do believe he is a good person and that if he thought he could get it through tomorrow, he would repeal the Defense of Marriage Act and ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ in the military. And I think he would allow gay marriage not just civil unions. I understand that he is a President of a Senate that, even on his own side, is pretty conservative. But I think where he’s fucked up is on the PR. If he was just to say to the gay community, “You know what darlings, we’re not going to get to you for a couple of years. I’m going to try getting these things through first, would you mind? Believe me I’m still behind you, blah, blah, blah.” We would have been like “Suuuure”. But that hasn’t happened. His administration has put out statements that have been quite offensive. And he’s then tried to counter it with some quite empty gestures. Throw us a bone, not a dog treat. But I think I’m still feeling it. The great thing is that he is re-mobilising the gay community. It’s not a very political community but on 11 October there is a huge march in Washington for equality that Cleve Jones is organizing. In a funny sort of way, it would be good for Obama if all the states started to deal with it themselves. Basically that’s how they like to do things in America because they know that federal dictate could get people really offended. New York’s marriage equality bill is coming up again. It is slightly sad that we haven’t got more of a warm fuzzy from him, but I’m going to give him a bit more slack.

Tell us about your role in Lisa Kudrow’s new series Web Therapy. When’s that out?
It’s out. I saw it on iTunes. You have to pay to download it, but eventually it’ll be free. But it is fucking hilarious! She is a riot. I worship her.

The Comeback is cult-viewing at Attitude HQ…
It’s awful. Absolutely awful. In The Comeback she completely understands the way that people are so willing to humiliate themselves in American culture. She is just fantastic. I did this film with her years ago so I watched the whole of the first season of Web Therapy in one sitting on the computer at Christmas. Then I emailed her and said: “Fuck me, Lisa, I just watched all of Web Therapy and it was absolutely hilarious”. Then she was like, “Oh, well we are doing another season if you wanna be in it”. I was like, “YEAH!” So that’s a good lesson. If you like your friend’s things, TELL THEM.

You’re a prolific blogger but are not on Facebook or on Twitter…
I do have someone pretending to be me on Facebook. An imposter. It’s not like a fan site. It’s someone pretending to be me. And a lot of my friends think it is me. He’s got a photo that has not been released. I don’t know how he got that picture!

Maybe he’s a stalker?
He’s not done mean things. He just takes things off my website and stuff. [To his assistant] Actually, have you become friends with him, Brian? [Brian says yes] We’re going undercover; Brian has become his friend so he can see his profile. It’s funny because he’s got 700 friends, but there’s a group called ‘Alan Cumming is a Sex Bomb’, and that’s got 2000. Ha!

Would you ever turn to Twitter to get your points across?
I love a wee bit of a blog, but I just find the whole torturous thing of commenting constantly on your life rather than experiencing it and doing it is really dangerous. It’s like people who go on roller coasters with video cameras.

Quite. Congratulations on the OBE. Are you looking forward to meeting the Queen?
The Queenie! Yeah. My mum is just bursting with pride. The most exciting thing about it is that they mentioned that part of it was for gay causes in America. It meant something important than just for being in films and plays and stuff.

Money from one of your London shows is going to the National Aids Trust, and you’re starring and directing condom commercials promoting safe sex online. Do you think we are suffering from safe sex fatigue in this country? Especially in relation to the rise of barebacking and that safe sex is up for ‘discussion’ in online culture?
I think that’s terrible. It’s what I’m trying to say with the condom adverts I do online. AIDS will kill you, and it will make your life terrible. You can live longer now but there will be a wave of death when the new combinations stop being effective. [We contacted HIV professionals about Alan’s comment here and the balance of opinion suggests that we know enough about combination therapy to sustain treatment for HIV in the future. But this is a complicated issue and we are glad Alan has raised it. We will address it in a forthcoming edition - Ed.] And there are other horrible things out there. It just goes in phases, in terms of what level of education people get. I think in some way people want to be free, and not wear a condom as if a condom is an obstacle and something we have to do to protect from potential threat. Sometimes people do think, “Fuck the threat; I want to do the other thing!” It is a mental thing. There’s a psychologist here who said that it’s because the gay community has not properly grieved for the AIDS epidemic. In a way that’s why barebacking has become a sort of fetish. It’s up to all of us, especially people who have lived through a time when it was a real threat. It is still a real threat. But I remember that advert with that big iceberg, and I was just becoming sexually active when AIDS started. So I suppose it has been drummed into me. We all have to make sure, especially with young people, that you have to wear a condom. Not just because of HIV, just generally. There are lots of ugly things there. And if someone has not worn a condom with you, then they probably haven’t with many people. Think about it that way.

It’s our Sex Issue. So can we ask you for a tip?
Sex tip? Ummm… be honest about what you like. Beforehand and during, mostly during! I think just find out what someone likes when you are actually having it off with them, rather than having to say it up front. Much better saying, “I want you to fuck me” than saying, “Oh, I’m a top or I’m a bottom or… a versatile vocal pig.” Much rather find out you’re a versatile vocal pig when they’re doing things to you. I Bought a Blue Car Today plays at the Vaudeville Theatre in London’s West End from Tuesday 1 to Sunday 6 September. Box Office: 0844 412 4663 www.iboughtabluecartoday.com

When Attitude asked me to trawl through my personal life to dredge up three people I’ve had sex with – a relationship, a fling and a random encounter – and then with their help, give our relationships a post-mortem, I was doubtful I would find anyone willing to help me. And even if I did what would they say?

There was the possibility I’d be told: “You’re a crap shag with a shit personality and I only went home with you because I was drunk.” So it was with some trepidation I phoned up an ex-boyfriend and a former flame to ask them what they thought of me, our relationship, and the shagging. I’m still friends with two of them, but you know how it is, friendship with people you have had a sexual relationship of some sort with, often does not involve going into the specifics of what happened between the two of you between the sheets very often. So I didn’t know what to expect or how I would feel. Would it rekindle any romance or reduce me to a blubbering wreck? The first guy I called was Ajax, who I first met in 1996, but if you add up all the time we’ve spent together in the intervening years it’d probably be around two weeks. So that sounds like the “fling” candidate taken care of… I remember the first time I saw him. It was at a gig at the Astoria. He was wearing a leopard print Teddy Boy jacket so obviously stood out a bit. I thought he was handsome and a bit of a snappy dresser so I started talking to him. He went off to hang around with the band and we met up a couple of days later.

Nothing happened. He tried to dye my hair blue, it didn’t work, told me he didn’t want a relationship “with anyone” and went off back home to Oklahoma City. To my surprise he started writing to me (this was the 90s, before everyone had email, history buffs) and we became friends. I didn’t see him again until 2003. When we met again I didn’t want to ruin our friendship so initially didn’t want our relationship to go any further. But after several drinks at a Human League gig we started snogging and went back to my flat. Having sex with someone I’d had a crush on several years before was initially quite a surreal experience. On the one hand it seemed like a great idea, seize the moment, blah blah… on the other I was worried it might change our relationship beyond recognition and finish it off. Still, after all that time the chance to get better acquainted with his tattoos proved too great an opportunity to resist. A couple of days later I realised Ajax was footloose and fancy free, and was only too happy to hook up with other guys. This was clearly a fling, and not a relationship situation. The fact I thought he was so handsome – I think it’s the evil grin and dimple from a facial piercing that does it – was a bit of an impediment to me being totally emotionally unengaged about it though. We met up several more times, helpfully at a friend’s place I was flatsitting for. “That one time at your friend’s flat was the sexiest time I’d known”, says Ajax, surprisingly. “It was honestly the longest, most ongoing sexual happening. Continuous, like for 24 hours of never leaving the bedroom. We only left when I wanted to look at the local car showroom.” Well, that’s a nice appraisal isn’t it? I should point out that the 24 hours does include snoozing, dinner and the bizarre excursion to look at some cars though. This didn’t add up to much more though. Why’s that? “You can be the sweetest person when everything is going your way” he says. “But when you turn negative it is a streaming bitchfest like nothing else.” Charming! It should be pointed out the bitchfest kicked off when Ajax went to see one of my exes about renting a room in his flat, only for them to end up having sex and then telling me about it. Obviously, I was hugely pissed off about this. While I was fully aware nothing further would come of our relationship I thought his decision to cop off with one of my exes and then let me know about it was the height of bad manners. It felt the relationship had moved on from occasional indifference to blatant rejection. “I regret the circumstances around that”, says Ajax. “It wasn’t a very gentlemanly thing for me to do.” I met him again a few weeks later and again we ended up sleeping together but we soon drifted apart after that. I didn’t want to be drawn into a bizarre love triangle between me, Ajax and my ex. Not that Ajax was exactly battering my door down either.

I eventually started emailing him again after a friend’s illness put this tiff into perspective. Ajax came back to London earlier this year. Once again I met up with him expecting nothing would happen but, typically, got pissed and we ended up in bed together again. And what’s changed? Not much. “I couldn’t pursue a deeper relationship with you,” he says. “If you could harness your emotions into a more positive outlook you’d be a great catch. You’re intelligent, handsome and phenomenal in the sack. You sure know how to shine a pole. But great sex and shared interests can’t compete with our different outlooks on life.” Shine a pole? What a silver tongued devil! I’ll be sure to put that in the ‘skills’ section of my CV. Sigh. He’s a charming, funny bloke and I’m glad we’ve maintained a friendship but I’d fully agree that as far as romance goes this was doomed to failure. The second person from the past is the first man I ever moved in with, Mark. I met Mark eight years ago when I was working in Scotland. We were at a bar launch and were introduced by a mutual friend. Luckily free shots were dispensed every 20 minutes as part of the opening. All the booze helped break the ice and soon we were getting on really well. Mark is a very funny, charismatic guy with a handsome face and bright green eyes. He went off to another bar to meet friends and I invited myself along. By the end of the night we were snogging and as I lived close by he came back to my flat.

Due to being drunk out of my skull I can’t remember much about our first night of passion but we decided to do it again the following evening. Our sex life wasn’t out of the ordinary but as with most new relationships, especially one likes ours when we saw so much of each other, there was quite a lot of it. I was leaving to return to London in six weeks but during that period we saw each other almost every day. I met loads of his friends and was even introduced to his family. Instead of splitting up we decided to try a long distance relationship. A cliché about long distance relationships is that they always end with one partner cheating but that wasn’t a problem. After all it’s easier not to go out and have sex with some random bloke. Plus going on the pull when I was in a relationship with someone I cared about would have been slightly demented. Keeping your dick in your pants isn’t an impossible task, especially when you’ve got nothing to gain from a random fling and plenty to lose. I’d go to Scotland every month or he’d come to me. After eight months we got a flat together in South London, which is when the problems really started. Our early relationship was a bit of a honeymoon period and when we’d visit each other later it was like a series of fun weekends away rather than pursuing a serious relationship that needed working at.

So when we moved in together we were still getting to know each other and things cooled off pretty quickly. Mark got a job in a bar, working nights, I was working days so we hardly saw each other. With financial pressures, as well as the usual rows about washing up, our sex life started to flounder. “We weren’t as affectionate” says Mark, “which I found hard to deal with.” Listening to this revelation all these years later, I’m in full agreement. We seemed to have gone from being affectionate with each other to arguing over a range of petty issues extremely quickly. Mark’s suggestion to reignite the sexual chemistry was to start masturbating in the communal hallway. He’d split up with David, a postman he’d dated for several months, shortly before we’d met. Apparently David had enjoyed nothing more than wanking in the hall as Mark watched him through the letterbox. I’m a broadminded bloke but was a bit taken aback. Two other flats used the same front door and I didn’t fancy the idea of my neighbours catching Mark with his penis out in their hall. We also lived on a fairly busy road and thought people might find it suspicious if I was crouched outside peering through the letterbox. “I haven’t done that for years,” says Mark. “I just thought it was a harmless suggestion but you didn’t react very well. At least I was trying to come up with ideas to improve our relationship.”

Friends chipped in with useless advice. One told me he’d been in a similar situation to me and Mark with his own boyfriend until he went along with his suggestion to try pissing over each other. He told me they’d visited several Travel Lodges within the M25 as the disabled bathrooms, with their floor-toceiling tiling, made for the ideal watersports environment, and that this new hobby had brought them closer together. I didn’t fancy the sound of that either. Another pal told me I should learn to enjoy the arguments, as “making up is the best part”. The last thing I want to do after a row over an electric bill with someone who calls me a “selfish cunt” is have sex with them. If arguments really worked as an aphrodisiac Mark and I would have been at it non-stop during our last month together. Instead, five months after he moved in he moved out again. It was sad, especially as we went into it thinking everything would be a huge success, but after watching our relationship dissolve for five months the end of it came as a bit of a relief. “The lack of sex towards the end was a problem,” says Mark. “But there were bigger issues between us. We couldn’t stand each other when we split up. We had unrealistic expectations going in and thought things would work out all by themselves.”

Luckily, after a few months of exchanging abusive text messages, we patched things up and are good friends now. The basis of my relationship with Mark wasn’t sex, it was really more that we were both attracted to each other and he had a great personality. Which makes it easy to be friends now. We’ll occasionally have a drunken conversation about getting back together again but our friendship is more important to both of us than a quick shag that might prove an embarrassing and pointless trip down memory lane. We’ve been there before, grown up a lot, and it’s better for us to be friends than weigh each other down with unrealistic romantic expectations, which finished things off before. The third example is from someone who was never an option for a relationship. Not least of which because I didn’t know his name and wouldn’t be able to pick him out in a police line-up today. This encounter occurred way back in 1998 during a period when I was probably drinking a little bit too much.

My flatmate James was gay and much more attractive than me. So when we’d go out the usual pattern was for him to pull all around him while I’d sit in a corner, drinking myself into oblivion. This Friday night was no different. Tiring of his popularity versus the barren social wasteland I was engulfed in I staggered out of the venue and tried to go home. As usual I’d forgotten what part of town I was in and didn’t know where the night bus went from. I got into a random unlicensed minicab outside the club. The Turkish looking driver started the engine, pulled off and said, “So this is a gay club, yes?” I didn’t need to be Nancy Drew to unravel this mystery! And since I was unemployed and skint at the time I saw the opportunity to save some valuable cash. Some chit-chat ensued in which he said he had a girlfriend but seemed quite interested in talking about why some men liked gay sex. Hmmm. Experience had taught me when discussing gay sex with a man who identifies as straight but is clearly up for it, it’s best just to say there’s nothing “gay” about two men shagging. And amazingly, it sounds even more convincing after 14 blackcurrant Hooches (remember those?) There’s no point sharing theories about sexual identity in a situation like this… And Mr Taxi Driver needed scant encouragement. He said, “I have a friend, you will like to meet.” Me, being drunk and stupid, anticipated a little detour to his pal’s house. Obviously, reader, he was talking about his huge cock and got it out and started masturbating as he was driving down Green Lanes. Good grief.

We got back to my place where I showed him to my room and cleared out the Pot Noodle containers. He was clearly no novice to this shagging-drunk-idiots routine as he had condoms with him. There’s no way I’d recognise this bloke again and he wasn’t anything special to look at with his clothes on, although I do remember his hair was a bit bouffanty, but when he got his clothes off it was a different story. Reader, he was GAWJUS! A bit 6 foot, olive skin, defined and muscular and with a big willy. So we got down to business. He looked fantastic but turned out to be hugely passive. That’s life! And the condoms weren’t required in the end (ie we didn’t do bottom sex, I wouldn’t be stupid enough to be unsafe). With it all over and done with he put his pants back on. I hadn’t noticed them before but the image of his bright yellow thong style underwear is seared onto my brain as, unsurprisingly, I’d never pulled anyone who’d worn that type of under garment before. Now, when I’ve told this story before, which wasn’t very often even at the time because, let’s face it, sucking off a taxi driver in an attempt to dodge the bill isn’t anything to boast about, I’ve told people I got the journey for free. But now, racking my brains, I think that’s a lie. I vaguely recall him standing there afterwards with his hand out and me giving him a five-pound note. The sheer cheek of it! Still, that was at least a 50 per cent discount but, from my perspective, it wasn’t an entirely successful transaction. Attitude asked me to try to track down this random encounter. But really, who knows where he is now? Deported? In jail? Still doing this taxi shtick? I’m a bit old to be getting hammered out of my tiny mind these days, investigating the illegal mini cab industry outside London’s gay clubs. Times have changed. We’ve all heard stories about people being abducted at knife point and having their bank accounts drained.

At 34 this whole episode seems a bit tawdry and, well, insane. But at 23 I thought it was the bargain find of the century! So what did I learn from it? Not much at the time. Although in hindsight, spending my early 20s mixing antidepressants and huge quantities of booze seems to have had some pretty potentially disastrous consequences. Oh well. We’ve all done it haven’t we? No? Cringe.

Paul Burston:Time out gay editor
Twenty years ago I was working for the gay policing group Galop, taking calls from men who’d been arrested for having sex in parks or public toilets. Some were married, and afraid that their wives would find out. Some were openly gay, and worried that their boyfriends would find out. Most feared a criminal record as a sex offender and exposure in the local newspaper. Some lost their jobs. A few were defiant and felt that public sex was part of their culture, as George Michael recently informed a photographer on Hampstead Heath.

Back in those days, there were very few gay saunas or sex clubs, and men caught with their trousers down were often charged with the specifically gay crime of ‘gross indecency’. Galop didn’t condone this kind of behaviour, but we didn’t condemn it either. And as long as there was inequality under the law, there was a strong case for arguing that the policing of gay public sex was by its very nature homophobic. And argue it we did. Why were the police wasting valuable time hanging around public toilets when there were burglaries and violent crimes being committed elsewhere? And how could they possibly justify sending socalled ‘pretty policemen’ into well known cottages in order to entice men into committing unlawful acts? Police entrapment was a popular pastime in those days, and an increasingly difficult one for the police to justify. Galop spoke out about what we saw as a cynical attempt by the police to boost their crime clear-up figures. We provided emotional support and gay friendly solicitors for people who needed them. And thanks to a very progressive chief superintendent at Hampstead, we also helped change the policing of gay public sex. Soon it was agreed that men having sex late at night in a remote part of the Heath were unlikely to be outraging public decency, since the only members of the public likely to be there were other gay men looking for a bit of sex al fresco. So to all intents and purposes, this part of the Heath was seen as private and therefore beyond the long arm of the law.

Twenty years on, Hampstead Heath is still a popular gay cruising area and people are still having sex and avoiding prosecution. But an awful lot has changed. The gay crime of ‘gross indecency’ no longer exists. Gay men in places like London are spoilt for choice when it comes to saunas and sex clubs. And for those who don’t have a sauna on their doorstep, there’s always the internet. Thanks to websites like Gaydar and Manhunt, ordering sex can be as simple as ordering pizza. In short, it’s never been easier for gay men to arrange to meet for casual sex. Yet some people still persist in waving their willies in public. At a well-known family sports centre in central London, it isn’t uncommon to see gay men openly soaping their erections while straight men are trying to take a shower with their young sons. And it’s not just willy waving. In Vauxhall, South London, close to where I live, two men were recently seen having penetrative sex on a traffic island in full view of everyone in the middle of a summer’s day. Something tells me they were drunk or on drugs. God knows what the drivers stuck at the traffic lights thought, but there’s a strong possibility that some of those cars were carrying small children. I wouldn’t have liked to have been the parent forced to explain to their kid what one man was doing with his penis up another man’s bottom in broad daylight.

A few years ago, there was an outcry from OutRage when Camden council decided to cut down the trees in Russell Square to discourage gay men from having sex there. Unlike some remote corner of Hampstead Heath, Russell Square is in the middle of a residential area. People living in the square weren’t too keen on the thought of people having sex on their doorstep, and I can’t say I blame them. Never mind the dirty condoms and packets of lube regularly found littering the square. I wouldn’t want to see straight people having sex on my doorstep, so why should local residents be expected to put up with gay men having sex in their local square? Public sex is not a right, gay or otherwise. It’s an infringement on other people’s space and is very likely to cause offence. There was a time when it could be argued that having sex in parks and public toilets was a symptom of gay men’s oppression. Now it’s simply a symptom of our self indulgence. Of course there are some people who are determined to cling onto their outsider status, rather like those pre-liberation types who go all misty-eyed as they tell you how much more exciting it was back then, when you could be imprisoned for having sex with a guardsman in St James Park. These are often the same people who regard gay marriage as ‘undignified’ and spend their weekends on their knees in public lavatories being ‘radical’. But the fact remains that gay men have rights now, and with rights come responsibilities. If your idea of a good time is to have sex with as many people as possible in any given time period, there are plenty of clubs and saunas where you can go and do just that. Some even have camouflage netting so you can pretend you’re having sex in the bushes, the way some gay men like to dress up and pretend they’re soldiers or scally lads or various members of the Village People. (By the way, is there any sight more ridiculous than some queen cruising the dunes in Gran Canaria dressed in full leathers? Answers on a postcard please).

Cottaging is no more a part of gay culture than dogging is a part of straight culture. Most heterosexuals would no sooner go dogging than they would stop shopping at Asda. And as the American gay activist Larry Kramer pointed out many years ago, if gay men want equal rights we have to think beyond our cocks and arses. Today, in this country, we have more or less equal rights. We have an equal age of consent, protection from discrimination at work and in the provision of goods and services, and even partnership rights. Homophobia hasn’t gone away, but legally speaking at least, we’re out of the woods. So when I see gay men soaping their erections in full view of small children, or fucking on a traffic island in broad daylight, it makes me cringe. Not because they’re expressing their sexuality, but because they’re doing it in a way which is anti-social and, frankly, an embarrassment to us all. For me, gay rights don’t include the right to have sex whenever and wherever we please. We are more than just our cocks and arses. And if we’re going to let our genital organs do our thinking for us, there’s a very simple solution. Get a room.
Paul Burston’s novel The Gay Divorcee is out now.
www.paulburston.com

Simon Gage:Senior contrib Ed
I’ve never been much of a one for one night stands. It’s not that I’m a prude, it’s just that I find it difficult to maintain a full erection when faced with some of the things you find at people’s houses. Call me pernickety but getting back to a guy’s flat to be faced with a living shrine to Chanel skin products in a bathroom (Barcelona, 2007) or a kimono/silk slipper combination (same location and date) or a cat litter tray in the bedroom (somewhere in Earl’s Court) can totally ruin the mood. Let’s face it, ten minutes conversation in a taxi can completely kill any idea of sexy, so gentlemen’s homes are just busting with reasons why I’m not staying. Unless I’m too drunk to go home, obviously. While other people are Gaydar-ing themselves into a frenzy/their local STI clinic, I must admit I’m really not down with the internet hook-up scene. I’m not even sure I have a Gaydar profile. If I do it’s so old the photo will be an early daguerreotype of me in a frock coat and top hat twirling my magnificent melodrama moustache with a penny farthing parked in the hallway behind me. And I certainly wouldn’t dream of pitching up at someone’s house after a couple of ‘Are you hung?’ exchanges online like a priapic Avon Lady: “Ding-dong, ding dong calling”. And I’m absolutely not having all comers round mine. Not with carpeting.

But that’s not to say I’m not game for fun of a genital kind outside a long-term relationship. Au contraire. But if it’s going to be quick and nasty, then let’s do our shopping live in the flesh. Just like you wouldn’t buy clothing on the internet – or maybe you would: personally I need to feel the fabric, hold it to my face, try it on (am I sounding like Barcelona kimono boy here?) – you really shouldn’t shop for boys online. You simply don’t know what you’re getting. Quite apart from that old potato of using a photograph where you look more like Robert Pattinson than… well, an old potato (are people too lazy or cock-hungry to turn these guys away when they pitch up, the clear perpetrators of false advertising?), you need more information than you can ever get online. You need to smell them (not like that, just in a chemistry-type way), see how they move, judge their levels of hygiene, see how they look on your arm. That kind of thing. Which is why I recommend – and have always recommended – picking up guys for sex in parks. And toilets. And anywhere they congregate for the purpose. At least that way you really know what you’re getting. OK, so you don’t know their mother or where they went to school or if they have a criminal record (this can be the one downside, the criminal thing, but at least you’re in public and not face down on your own bathroom tiles where no one can hear you scream with a ligature around your neck and someone measuring your skin up for an outfit Silence of the Lambs-style). But, even if it means your post-coital whisperings will be with your face pressed up against a cubicle partition instead of on Egyptian cotton sheet, at least you know the deal before you enter into it. Or him. Or… you know what I mean.

You know the look, the smell, the rough age, the general cleanliness before you chow down. And if you change your mind, you zip up and walk away, no explanation necessary. How does that compare with trying to get rid of the man on your sofa with bad breath talking you through the painstaking construction of his new conservatory when he now looks more like Wendy Craig than Daniel Craig? And while ‘dating’ sites stand accused of ruining people’s social lives by making them opt for an evening indoors poring over the catalogue of cock instead of going out and meeting real live human beings, cruising the heath is in comparison high society. People meet, talk, share a cigarette, a breath mint, decide to meet for a drink later – after they’ve noshed off fifteen more people – maybe become friends. It’s not that awful one-on-one pressure you get from someone called Spunkboy69 pitching up at your front door smelling of pilchards. If you don’t like Spunkboy or Conservatory Man you don’t have to spend the night getting rid of him – you move onto the next one. Even if you do like him, you can still move onto the next one. Maybe even with Spunkboy in tow (I think we’ve got rid of Conservatory Man by now, don’t you?) Things can get threesome-y of their own accord. Parties can break out spontaneously. I’ve seen men doing it round an impromptu bonfire. Am I making this sound like St. Tropez in the heyday of Scott F. Fitzgerald yet?

But seriously, there is nothing wrong with picking up a little bit of something saucy while you’re out. Tory wives obviously complain that gay men are ruining the park for their children – though what those children are doing in the back end of the woods at two in the morning is anyone’s guess – but I feel that as a tax payer I have a right to use the facilities in my way as long as I’m not treading on flower beds or spitting in the water fountain. I don’t have children to ruin the grass with their football or dogs crapping the place up (though dogs are very good accessories/alibis), so why shouldn’t I timeshare the park? You bring your kids when it’s open, I’ll climb over the gates when it’s shut. As for those that complain about sex outside being an outrage to public decency, I’ve witnessed girls all but give their boyfriends handjobs on public transport at rush hour so I’m not sure why anyone is concerned by the nocturnal naughties of gay men they will never clap eyes on. Unless they’re spying from their back bedroom windows with infra-red binoculars like those freaks who tried to ‘name and shame’ gay cruisers by putting their photos on the internet recently. I do agree that gay men using parks and open spaces of natural beauty for their own mischievous ends should pick up after them – no one wants their dachshund chewing on a grubby jonny quite frankly – but that applies to anyone using the park. I don’t want to step in a dog’s business or Cornetto wrappers or trip over teenagers’ cider bottles. So, let’s return to the civilised days of cruising and cottaging where no gay man’s house was complete without a pair of muddy boots by the front door (you really did know what your friends had been up to when you saw that). The glory days when a simple answering of the call of nature could lead to a fat cock being rammed through a hole in the wall and into your face. The time when a post-dinner ‘breath of fresh air’ really meant dad going to get his balls licked before brandy.

This online ‘dating’ thing is anti-social, dangerous, time-consuming and worst of all, just not very sexy at all.

Lions and tigers and Ben. Oh my. “Big” Ben Cohen is quite possibly the hottest sportstar to come onto our radar since, dare we say it, David Beckham. The hirsute hulk of a rugby player (and unwitting bear icon) started his professional career at his hometown team Northampton Saints, at the age of 17. His career skyrocketed when he was picked for England and went on to be part of the winning team that triumphed at the World Cup in 2003. Ben’s just come back from a continental two year stint at French team Brive and is now signed up with Manchester based team Sale Sharks. He’s determined to return to England for another, last stab at the next World Cup in 2011. “I want to go out on a high. That’s how I see it really,” he says, straightforwardly.

Upon meeting Ben, you’re struck by his sheer stature. When the 31 year old 6ft 4 inch piece of hotness emerges from the changing room wearing merely a guffawing grin and a tiny pair of Calvin Klein underpants, we are agog. It’s almost as if the tiny piece of cotton is groaning under the strain of insufficiently fitting his epic proportions. How does he feel about being such a brazen object of desire? “It doesn’t bother me,” he casually replies. “If someone gets off on it, I don’t know why they would. But fair play, if it helps them out.” Despite his laid back and polite persona there’s no denying he’s exists in the pantheon of a select merry band of sport stars that have achieved gay icon status. There are few other heterosexual sport players that are so cool with ‘the gay thing’, as our shocking report on page 48 will testify. In that respect, he’s up there with previous Attitude cover stars David Beckham and Freddie Ljungberg, so what does he make of his ever-growing gay following? “It’s amazing how some people have a big phobia,” he says. “I enjoy being round gay people. I get on better with them than straight people. I’m comfortable in my sexuality; I love my own company. I feel that sometimes I can be a hard person to get on with, I must admit. My family was brought up in the entertainment industry. We ran nightclubs so I was brought up to be open-minded. I’ve seen a lot at a young age.” He adds: “To be honest with you. When I finish rugby I go home to my family. That is my priority. I don’t really go out. Now the girls are here [he has two year old twin girls Isabelle and Harriett with his wife Abby] outside of rugby that takes up all of my time, which I love.”

Unlike Beckham and other achingly metrosexual sport stars, Ben has very little to do with cultivating an image and promoting himself. It originally begun online – much against his own will. “I didn’t really want to do a website,” he admits. “I don’t look at myself in any way other than this is just me. I’m not academic; I’m good at rugby. I’m good at physical stuff and that’s where I learnt my trade. If someone wants to take time to look at a website, that to me is quite strange. But my agent at the time said that’s what we’re going to do; it sort of went on from there.” Next was an official Ben Cohen 2005 calendar, which was somewhat unsurprisingly quite a hit. “We were getting quite a lot of gay males buying it,” he grins. “I thought: Fantastic! At least someone is paying bloody interest.” And the rest, as they say, is gay history. A quick Google and you’ll notice his considerable internet presence. A particular favourite at Attitude HQ is Ben chatting to Fern Britton and Philip Schofield in his underpants on This Morning to raise awareness about testicular cancer.

When we read out some of the comments that are posted below the clip – “Freak’in HOT!!!” and “plz can I reincarnate as Ben Cohen’s shorts??” – he starts laughing, nervously. ”Well, how would you feel?” he giggles. “I think I feel a bit flattered. At least someone likes me. It’s nice to have someone like you whether it’s a man or a woman. It’s flattering.” Ben says his grounded nature comes in part from winning an MBE. “I got a medal in the cupboard. It’s nice to have but it doesn’t mean anything. [So similarly] when someone says: ‘Oh, you’re a gay icon.’ I just think: ‘Fantastic. Do you want a cup of tea, now? Thanks.’” But he’s quick to add that he doesn’t take it for granted. “I am proud of it,” he says. “It’s just a status, isn’t it? It’s not like I’m a multi-millionaire or got something out of it.” Well, you’ve got a cover on Attitude magazine! Surely Heat’s torso of the week beckons. ”Oh, hahaha! Cos I disagree, I really disagree!” he exclaims. “I don’t have a good six-pack at all. I might have a good four-pack and a bit of a barrel at the bottom. If I flicked through the magazine and saw myself in there I would be horrified!” What? “I honestly don’t think that I’ve got a good body,” he says. “I’ve got a hairy body that I have to clip now because my girls pull the hair on my chest and it bloody hurts.” He can tell this is falling on deaf ears. “Mate, seriously, I don’t think I’ve got a good body. And that’s not cause I want you to say I have. I don’t look in the mirror and go: ‘Fucking hell Benny, good body.’ I look at it and go, actually, I need to lose some more weight, I need to do some more work and I’ll go into the gym and I’ll try, I don’t really think I have a good body. If people do then fair enough. I think it’s my genetic make-up. I don’t really have much of a say in it,” he says.

Family is his first concern, and the main reason his big man feet are so firmly on the ground: “When I finish rugby I go home to my family. That is my priority.” It’s also the reason he’s now back in the UK. Adjusting to life on the continent was tough on him and his new family. “When I left Northampton I had a horrible two years,” he says. “I earned good money playing in France but it was very difficult there. I kept a roof over my kids’ heads. But I probably pissed my career down the drain a little bit and I’m trying to prove to myself and other peop

Ben is now back in the UK, playing for Sale Sharks, in Greater Manchester, and has his sights set on representing the England team at forthcoming World Cup scheduled for New Zealand in 2011. Ben triumphed at the World Cup in 2003 but pulled out of the last one in 2007 because his wife became pregnant with twins after trying for four years. “We were struggling to get pregnant for four years,” he says. “I put rugby first for so long that I had to put my wife and unborn kids first for a while.” On the rest of his career, he adds: “This is my last shot before I retire in three or four years time”. This is the first moment you get a glimpse of the steel beneath his relaxed exterior; Ben is back and more determined than ever to prove himself for the remaining few years of his professional rugby career. “I’m not a person who looks back in hindsight,” he says, “because you can’t do fuck all about it. Things happen for a reason. I grew up a fucking lot. You’re a long time dead. And in rugby a long time retired and I think I’m the kind of person who gives 100% in everything I do. I’ll do stuff I’m uncomfortable with and I’ll crack on with it. I have tried other things other than rugby but it never really came off. Rugby is my bread and butter.

“You can do what’s in front of you. You can change that way, in how you want to be perceived and what you want to do. But [in France] I was out of sight and out of mind of England. That’s why I needed to come back here,” he says. Ben says his drive stems from his childhood and from his view that others considered he was “never fucking good at school”. “I think there was always that perception: ‘Oh Ben Cohen won’t do any good as long as long he’s always got a hole in his arse,’” he says. “For me there was that determination to prove a lot of people wrong. I’m not the most skillful player in the world but I make it up with a lot of hard work. I have to work on my game to make me a world-class player. And that’s why I was determined to come back again.”

Sadly, there’s a lot of sport stars would be less inclined to bare all for us; do you notice any homophobia on the pitch? “Everyone is generally open-minded because of the time we’re in, especially with younger players coming through. I haven’t genuinely seen any of that,” he says. He’s impressed with openly gay Welsh rugby referee Nigel Owens: “It’s all good. Because he’s in a very masculine sport and an official. Everyone just cracks on with it. They’re not really interested.” Warming to his theme, Ben reckons it would actually be in a Premiership football player’s interest to come out: “He would be unbelievably wealthy and unbelievably famous, simply because he came out. I think a trend would follow. I think a lot of people in the closet would come out and support it.” With our time almost up we’re intrigued to find out if he knows what a bear is? “Is it like a hairy body?” Correct. And, we tell him, he’s creating somewhat of a renaissance (refer to page 66, readers). With characteristic understatement, he doesn’t see it like that.

”I didn’t know it actually went that deep. I’m flattered with that, if I’m kick-starting a trend. It’s nice to know, and nice to be wanted that way.” What are his future plans, then? Sport is a famously short-lived profession. “Rugby’s always treated me well,” he says. “When I wasn’t in rugby for a few months I realised how much I missed it and that I’d like to stay in it some way. I’d say rugby but I haven’t got a fucking clue in a way. I’m being a bit open minded in that respect.” You could perhaps open a bear pub? ‘Cohen’s’ could be franchised from Soho to Canal St… “A bear pub?,” he beams, and for a moment it’s as if we can hear a tiny light bulb explode in his mind. “A big hairy bear pub!” www.ben-cohen.com

Back in July, casting around for something vaguely cultural to fill an empty afternoon, I took a female friend to see the Gay Icons exhibition at London’s National Portrait Gallery. Although the concept seemed a little skewed (photographs of gay icons, not necessarily gay, but chosen by gay people), its heart was essentially in the right place. Still, expecting nothing more significant than the sight of Kylie in those hotpants, in amongst the choices – some obvious, some wildly perplexing – it soon became apparent there was something here to be learnt. Visibly moved by what she saw, my friend was particularly taken with the image and accompanying story of a man called Alan Turing. “I’ve been oblivious to one of the most brilliant men of the twentieth century,” she declared post-viewing. “Surely that can’t be right?” I had no idea who he was either. The photograph in the exhibition is a grainy, non-descript portrait of an average looking man; yet a quick look at the internet reveals Alan Turing to be one of the UK’s greatest historical figures.

Oddly, though, in spite of being more than worthy of the title, he’s simultaneously a figure hardly anyone’s ever heard of. Strange. And therein lies the rub. How could someone as prolific as this, a mathematical genius whose prodigious ideas about computing in the 1930s led directly to the world of PCs and the internet, be so un-well known? How could this gentle, heroic man, the genius individual who decrypted the German Enigma codes at Bletchley Park during WW2, be so overlooked? This is a man who literally helped us win the war, almost certainly making it shorter by at least two years. Think about how many lives he potentially saved. Then think about what else his brilliantly inventive mind could have achieved had he lived longer. As it was, Turing was dead at forty one, a homosexual convicted of ‘gross indecency’. Simon Greenish, Director of Bletchley Park Trust, believes he was one of the greatest minds of the twentieth century. “But he could have gone on to achieve considerably more,” he says. “Turing was involved in no end of different projects, and at the forefront of modern technology. I think the potential is there for him to have done much, much more than he actually did.” Alan Turing was a sceptical man who was often indifferent to conventional values. Brilliant from a young age, as a fellow at King’s College, Cambridge, he wrote On Computable Numbers, his landmark paper published in 1936, which is considered the founding work of modern computer science. His potential ability as a code breaker had been identified early on and he was introduced to the secret operations at the Government Codes and Ciphers School in London.

On 4 September, 1939, the day after Britain declared war on Germany, Turing reported to work at Bletchley Park, Britain’s code breaking centre. It was here that his secretive assignments (no one knew what went on there until many years later) were perfected, and his incredible knowledge of cryptanalysis was put to use. At Bletchley he developed and perfected an electromechanical machine called the Bombe that could break the codes of Nazi Enigma machines and tap in to the German’s naval strategy – a significant breakthrough that saved countless lives. In 1945 he was awarded the OBE for his wartime services, a hero feted for his amazing intellect and analytical prowess. A few years later he would build on this body of work and attempt to create his own computer, but the classified status of his wartime work prevented him from realising that dream.

Turing did work in a team at Manchester University, who in the early 1950s developed one of the world’s very first computers. Turing’s contention that the computer could rival the computing power of the human brain correctly anticipated the field of Artificial Intelligence. Turing should have died a hero, but instead went to the grave in shame. His crime? Simply being gay in the 1950s, a time when homosexuality in the United Kingdom was an abomination, punishable by long sentences in jail, or subjection to a range of completely inhumane aversion therapies. When Turing – an open, trusting but somewhat naïve chap – was caught having an affair with a 19 year old Mancunian called Arnold Murray, the resulting fall-out would completely change the course of his life. A friend of Murray’s had burgled Turing’s house, thinking the respectable mathematician would resist reporting it to the police to avoid blackmail. Yet Turing did report it and unwittingly implicated himself as a ‘deviant homosexual’, later to be charged with a count of gross indecency. In reality, all Turing did was have consenting sex with another man in private, and yet this was akin to the very worst crimes of the day. For many gay men of that era jail would have been inevitable, yet Turing was given the opportunity to turn down prison in favour of chemical castration – an invasive course of female oestrogen injections designed to halt the libido of sex offenders.

Today such treatments would only be administered to the worst of paedophiles, which gives you some idea of how gay men were viewed back then. Ultimately, as a fit, Olympic-standard runner and rower with a brilliant mind, the decision to opt for castration was tragic, although, and this says so much about 50s society, it was obviously preferable to losing his professional reputation. Inevitably, though, the hormones made him depressed and ill, he lost muscle mass, and even, much to his obvious distress, started to develop breasts. Two years later in 1952, Turing was found dead in the bedroom of his modest Cheshire home, a man driven to suicide by constant scrutiny and other reasons we may never know. A genius destroyed by the justice of the very establishment he had given his intellect to.

Over 50 years later, justice is being sought. A man called John Graham- Cumming, a straight computer scientist whose profession lead him to the work and life of Turing, is so incensed at the way Turing has been airbrushed out of history he’s set up a petition calling on the British Government to openly apologise for what took place. ‘Alan Turing was the greatest computer scientist ever born in Britain,’ it reads. ‘He laid the foundations of computing, helped break the Nazi Enigma code and told us how to tell whether a machine could think. The British Government should apologise to Alan Turing for his treatment and recognise that his work created much of the world we live in and saved us from Nazi Germany. And an apology would recognise the tragic consequences of prejudice that ended this man’s life and career.’ Graham-Cumming thinks that Turing demands just as much respect as Churchill or Roosevelt and wishes to see Britain honour his memory and work. “I believe we lost a man at forty-one who, in another forty years, could have done tremendous work given the amazing things he’d already done in his short life,” he said. Soon after, high profile figures such as Stephen Fry, Peter Tatchell and author Ian McEwan began urging people to sign the petition, Fry through his incredibly popular postings on Twitter. Inevitably, many more thousands have now added their name, all calling for the Government to recognise the “consequences of prejudice” that ended Turing’s blighted life. McEwan has even gone as far as writing to the Queen, demanding both an apology and exoneration for Turing’s treatment and crimes and for him to be awarded a posthumous Knighthood. Further support comes from evolutionary biologist and science author Professor Richards Dawkins, who says that an apology would “send a signal to the world which needs to be sent”, and that Turing would still be alive today if it were not for the repressive, religion-influenced laws which drove him to despair.” The author of The God Delusion, who will present a forthcoming television programme for Channel 4 on Turing, Dawkins says the impact of the mathematician’s war work could not be overstated. “Turing arguably made a greater contribution to defeating the Nazis than Eisenhower or Churchill. After the war, when Turing’s role was no longer top-secret, he should have been knighted and fêted as a saviour of his nation. Instead, this gentle, stammering, eccentric genius was destroyed, for a ‘crime’, committed in private, which harmed nobody.”

One man who knows Turing well is his biographer, Andrew Hodges. It was his beautifully researched book that was turned into Breaking The Code, the play and subsequent film of Turing’s life, starring Derek Jacobi. He’s a person who’s been following Turing’s story for almost 40 years. “I knew Turing’s name because I’d come across it as a student,” he tells me, “but I always wanted to know more about him. In 1972 I was a member of the Gay Liberation Front, and through that I met two people who had known Alan Turing and how badly he had been treated. One of them was Nicholas Furbank, a well-known literary figure, and the other was James Atkins who was Alan Turing’s first boyfriend at Cambridge. So I had quite an early connection with this story as it came through the GLF grapevine. Very few people knew what Turing had been put through. None of this had ever been published anywhere. People didn’t want to know quite honestly. In those days it was thought of as being very disreputable.”

Talking to Andrew Hodges reveals a murky and tragic tale of a betrayed genius, Cold War paranoia, and homosexual persecution. “My own attitude to it has been consistent,” he says. “Being part of the early gay movement I thought this was an absolutely classic, vivid illustration of the things that happen when you have certain laws. His case is a supreme example of irony. He’d done so much to ensure the country actually still existed and yet was persecuted afterwards by the state he had done so much to save. The irony is very acute.” But Hodges also thinks the case simply illustrates what happened to a whole section of society. “What about his boyfriend? Why doesn’t he get an apology too? They had [committed] the same crime. I don’t think a specifi c apology to Turing is the right way to look at it. It’s a human rights question.” Fittingly, human rights activist Donald Longden is also extremely sceptical about politicians “carrying onions in their pockets” to pull out at the right time. “Whilst I disagree with persecution, I fail to see the merit of a posthumous apology,” he says. “Turing wasn’t the only person convicted of homosexuality, he just happened to have made some signifi cant achievements in his lifetime. But what about the others?

Will any of the thousands of other people who have been convicted of such ‘crimes’ be pardoned? Are we saying you only get an apology in cases like this if you’ve done something memorable?” “It’s hard to know what kind of statement the petition’s actually asking for,” says Andrew Hodges. “Is it a legal thing – a pardon? In which case it’s not something the Prime Minister can just say. You can’t get away from the fact that if there’s any apology it should be to everyone that was affected by that law.” John Graham-Cumming had never even considered that other people suffered the way Turing did. And why would he? No one seems to document it. “I’m a computer scientist and that’s why I am aware of Turing’s work. I wanted to make the point that the man should have been honoured but the country then persecuted him to the point where he killed himself over something that was deemed not a crime just a decade or so later. The fi ght I set out to fi ght is for Turing the individual, but I think that if people want to have a discussion about what happened to everyone else, that would be a good thing. It is a totally valid thing to want to engage government and the country with. I would welcome it.”

Turing’s life and legacy throws up many issues. It reminds us how far we’ve come, but also that we’re still close enough to the event to realise homophobia and suspicion linger even in so called enlightened times. To those who say it was all a long time ago, that the world has changed, be reminded that Britain had the same monarch back then as we do now. In 2009 The Queen has gay men in her Government’s cabinet; but when she fi rst came to the throne, those same men were considered the lowest of the low. No, if any good comes out of this whole sorry business, it’s the fact that Turing and all the others who were subjected to the medical quackery and political hypocrisy of the day would ultimately bring about change. In 1959 the Wolfenden committee was set up to examine the shameful prosecution of many well known gay men in this country. Disregarding the conventional ideas of the day, the committee recommended that “homosexual behaviour between consenting adults in private should no longer be a criminal offence”. It would lead – albeit slowly – to the reform of the law in 1967. For many, though, this came far too late. It is important to honour and remember the dead, yet even more crucial that we salvage the reputations of those who were wrongly done by. When the petition is presented to 10 Downing Street next year, the apology and posthumous pardon we are looking for on Alan Turing’s behalf is more than just symbolic. What it spells out and reinforces is the message that this was a great man; let’s celebrate his achievements and remind people what he did in his extraordinary lifetime. The apology is important, but the more apologies proliferate they less meaningful they become. What it should signify is that mistakes were made with Alan Turing that should never be repeated. He is undoubtedly one of the most shoddily-treated fi gures of our time, and yet deserves our ultimate respect. Mathematical Philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein, a contemporary and sometime sparring partner of Turing’s, sums it up beautifully when he said: “When all possible scientific questions have been answered, the problems of life remain completely unanswered.”

You can sign the petition at http://petitions.number10.gov.uk/turing/ We would like to hear your thoughts on this subject as we believe there is a total lack of awareness of what gay people suffered pre 1967 and indeed since. We’d also love to hear from older readers about their experiences of life when homosexuality was illegal. Mail us at the regular address or send emails to the usual address..